The Impact on Jess Lee Brooks–Part Two
In this second post, we are now going to focus on one particular spiritual, “Go Down, Moses,” and the effect this spiritual had on the career of Jess Lee Brooks. This story is not in chronological order; instead, its purpose is to introduce an immortal performance of “Go Down, Moses” to you, a performance that I doubt you will ever forget.
Once again, in order to explain this spiritual to you, we are again going to provide a lengthy quote from my book, A Spiritual Journey Through Musicals and Movies:
If we want to hear the full power of the spiritual, we need to hear the total sound in a small church or concert hall, without amplification.
Recordings are second best because they capture a very small part of the sound that occurs on the stage. Standing next to a singer, then joining in on the chorus, is a thrill to the ear; the force of the music, the depth of the harmonies all create a power that is somehow lost in the digital playback. The recording captures part of the sound, but not nearly enough.
On the other hand, recordings may be all we have; and a recording can provide you with relative power, in that the differences between the highs and the lows are apparent, as are the overlays produced as the music moves from single voice to choral response.
We are going to provide you with a short video clip from the movie, Sullivan’s Travels, a Preston Sturges movie that was released in December 1941. It is a combination of satire and dramatic reality; it revolves around a Hollywood director, played by Joel McCrea, who wants to direct the great American tragedy. In order to direct such a picture, John L. Sullivan, the fictional director, sets out on a journey America to learn about the pain being experienced throughout the country. He gets more than he bargained for. Disguised as a hobo and wrongfully accused of murder, Sullivan has been sent to work on a chain gang in the south. This brutal existence is relieved every so often when prisoners who have behaved well get the chance to see a movie. Because no movie house will accept the prisoners, they are forced to view the movie from the pews of a black church situated in the back woods.
Our video clip starts with an interior shot of the church and an explanation being provided by its preacher, played to perfection by Jess Lee Brooks.
Listen to the genuine humility of the preacher as he prepares the first three rows of the church for the prisoners: “neither by word nor by action nor by look” should we make our guests feel unwelcome. “For we’re all equal in the sight of God.”
We usually enter a church while a hymn is being played on the church organ. In this case, the preacher suggests that they welcome their guests through song. It is his way to let the prisoners enter and carry with them some shreds of their lingering dignity. “Now let’s give our guests a little welcome.” And they break into a magnificent rendition of “Go Down, Moses,” led by the preacher’s solo lead.
In the second verse, we can now hear the clank of the chains synchronized to the sound of the spiritual.
The movie was unable to provide a lengthy dissertation on Negro spirituals, so it forced the audience to make all of the important associations; it used metaphorical “large themes;” repeated place, person and situation; built momentum; and used the deep, rumbling bass and baritone harmonic overtones to penetrate our outer being and enter into our inner soul.
“Go Down, Moses” starts by using the line: “When Israel was in Egypt land…” The use of this line forces us to compare the Jews held in captivity in Egypt with the former slaves, now poor black residents living under the tyranny of the Jim Crow South. However, it also forces us to associate the words with the chained convicts, now entering the church.
The choral response is “Let my people go.”
The next solo line “Oppressed so hard they could not stand” gives us a clear reference to all form of enslavement, even though the lines describe only the Jews in Egypt.
Again, the choral response is “Let my people go.” The reiteration reinforces the need for freedom and fairness for all.
Now, in unison, the lead and chorus sing “Go Down Moses,” which gives us the first Biblical reference to Moses as the man leading his people out of Egypt, out of captivity to the Promised Land.
The next line is “Way down in Egypt land,” but it could be restated to say “way down south in the land of cotton.”
We hear Moses tell Old Pharaoh to “Let my people go,” but we never hear about the parting of the Red Sea. We don’t need to hear about the rescue across dry land because we know it happened. We don’t need to hear about the pillar by day or the fire by night, because we know it happened. We don’t need to hear how Moses smote the rock and water poured forth, because we know both the rock and the water are part of the story.
Before we watch the clip, it is important to understand a little more about Mr. Brooks, the actor and singer who played the role of the preacher. Brooks was born in Montana and educated at Western University, outside Kansas City, Kansas. Western University was modeled after Booker T. Washington’s Tuskegee Institute, was recognized for its outstanding music school and graduated several women, such as Eva Jessye, “who were influential music pioneers in the early 20th century,” according to Wikipedia. He was also an essayist who wrote on the subject of education.
Until I read his biography in the movie website, IMDb, I was unwilling to accept the fact that he was an actor who had never preached a sermon in his life.
“Jess Lee Brooks a.k.a. Jesse Brooks was an exceptional actor … Movie audiences felt as though they knew him when seeing him off-screen because on-screen his natural, love, kind word for all and protective persona reminded them of their father. Even in Hollywood films, he often outshone many of the white leading stars with his strong presence like in Sullivan’s Travels where he gave an emotional performance that no one will ever forget after seeing it. Brooks died in 1944 and got respectful obituaries written about him.”
I have seen the movie many times, and I forget much of it, even though it has a fine cast and a great director in Preston Sturges. However, what I will never forget and will always keep close to my soul is this one segment of the movie. Whatever I hope to be, whatever I hope to leave as my legacy, I only hope and pray that it is half as good as what Jess Lee Brooks has left us.
This ends the excerpted quote from my book for this post.
Now, let’s watch the clip.